London

‘When I stepped out the airport at Heathrow, I breathed in London. For me it was like breathing in liberation. I felt peaceful for the first time in years,’ says 29-year-old Francis Weyi, who arrived in London from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo) in 2001.

Sitting in the Kentish Town barber shop where he works as a hairdresser, with wraparound shades, beads and chains hanging from his neck, Weyi radiates relaxed cool. It’s hard to believe that four years ago he was fleeing his home country, on the run for his life. Feature continues

Weyi grew up in poverty-stricken Kinshasa, capital of DR Congo (formerly Zaire and separate from the Republic of Congo, the Democratic Republic of Congo was renamed DR Congo under President Laurent Kabila in 1997). When he was 22, he got a place to study economics at Kinshasa University, where he became involved in a church group that was strongly opposed to Kabila’s increasingly despotic regime. Weyi was one of a number of student activists who handed out leaflets and attended political meetings to campaign against the government. ‘One evening at five o’clock, we were at a church meeting. Suddenly the police arrived and stopped anyone leaving. Our heads were covered in hoods, we were beaten – I still have the scars – and we were taken away in police vans. Under Kabila, lots of people disappeared, so I was terrified.’

But before reaching its destination, the speeding police van careered off the road and crashed into a tree. Along with seven other students, Weyi managed to escape. Realising he could no longer stay in Kinshasa, he paid $2,500 for a fake passport and headed for London. An uncle, already based here, took him in while he applied for asylum.

Weyi is typical of the estimated 11,000 Congolese in London who are mostly here as political asylum seekers. Although Congo’s historical roots lie with Belgium, there’s been a steady trickle of Congolese to London since the 1990s, and there are now pockets of the community in Hackney and Victoria, where Weyi still lives with his uncle, but by far the most vibrant stronghold is Tottenham, home to around 3,000 of Weyi’s fellow countrymen.